There was a sound coming from him, something shocked, forceful, and not remotely pleasing to the ear. There were words as well: accusations and interrogations, rambling, opium-induced confessions of things he might never even have done. But he wasn’t aware of any of it. He wasn’t aware of anything, except for the single, horrifying realization that he must have gone completely demented. Because nothing else, not even the laudanum, could explain Buffy Summers’ disappearing-reappearing act. Things like that just did not happen in the real world.
While he was telling himself this, Buffy was pulling at his sleeve in a vain attempt to redirect his attention. “William, it’s okay—it’s okay!” Her voice was low at first, but it grew more insistent as she struggled to get through to him, to drown him out. He wanted to do as she wished; he wanted to calm down. But his thoughts were too confused, his brain too dope-addled. He literally could not help himself.
She laid him on the grass with the sweep of one leg, an assault so smooth and deliberate it almost did not hurt. He landed flat on his back, and before he could move—before he could even consider moving—she flung herself on top of him, her slim body stretched at an angle across his own, the palm of one hand pressed firmly against his trembling, noisy mouth.
“William,” she said. “Stop it.”
Her tone was harsh, her green eyes stern, yet these were not the reasons he found himself capable of obeying her. It was the soft press of her breasts and the smooth, taut stretch of her bare thigh—the delicious friction of a hipbone placed just so—that finally caused him to fall silent. She might have been holding him down, but she was still holding him, and no woman had ever done that before. Perhaps he was mad and this was only happening in his head, but even if it were—
If it were—
Oh, God. If it were, he still didn’t want it to end. He would prefer madness.
It had been so long since he experienced real human contact he had almost forgotten how much he craved it, and even during an apparent return to composure, he felt taut and anxious, hungry for more. He pleaded silently with whatever deity might exist and feel compelled to intervene: Don’t let her move now. Don’t let her get up—oh, please—don’t get up—”
And she didn’t. Once it became clear that he had returned to his senses, her features relaxed in noticeable relief, yet she withdrew neither her hand nor her body. Instead, she dropped her head down until her brow came to rest against his own, and then she murmured, “William, you don’t have to be afraid. I promise I’m not going to hurt you. That’s not why I’m here.”
He jerked his chin in a nod of assent, murmured something indistinguishable behind the obstruction of her palm. She furrowed her brow and asked, “What?”
Of course, he could answer her no more distinctly now than before, so he did not try. He just looked at her, his eyebrows slightly lifted. After a moment’s hesitation, she cautiously removed her hand. “What?” she repeated.
She had not raised her head. If he opened his mouth a little wider—if his bottom lip trembled just a bit—they would have been kissing. His whole body ached with the effort of restraint, although he was not entirely certain restraint was what she wanted. Red-faced and awkward, he asked her for the second time, “Why are you here, Buffy?”
She smiled at him, the sad, soft smile that always seemed a trifle too knowing, and then she said, “Don’t you know, William? It’s you. I’m here because of you.”
If it had been up to him, he would have lain like that forever, pinned beneath her body, wrapped in her arms and tangled in her legs, her mouth hovering torturously close. But the weight of her pressed against his chest aggravated his breathing, and he began to cough—he couldn’t stop until she rolled off of him so he could sit up—and then he wanted to kill himself.
Buffy seemed to understand how he felt. She rubbed slow circles along his back with the palm of her hand, wincing at every paroxysmal hack. “Are you all right?” she asked anxiously. “Is there anything I can I get you?”
But he shook his head.
When he finally got his breath, his chest hurt and his head felt weak; all the good feelings from before were gone. He kneaded his forehead with the tips of his fingers and said wearily, “But that cannot be the truth.”
“What can’t be?”
“That I am the reason for your coming. Perhaps now…but on that first encounter I could not possibly have been…”
“Why would you think that?”
“Because you didn’t know me then. We had not yet met.”
“Maybe I came in order to get to know you,” she answered. Then, seeing his expression: “I came to get to know you, William. I came with the express purpose of meeting you and spending time with you. That’s the only reason why I ever—”
Well, that was unexpected, if not altogether baffling. He stared at her.
“For the love of God. Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why would you wish to meet me? How were you even aware of my existence?”
She shrugged, suddenly looking uneasy.
“That…is a really complicated story.”
“You might tell it, regardless.” William knew he was being rude, but he couldn’t put it in gentler terms than that. If he was not a lunatic and she was not a thief, then for what possible purpose had she sought him out? And how had she done it? How was she able to disappear and reappear at will? He didn’t consider himself out of line for assuming he had the right to know.
Buffy was chewing on her bottom lip.
“Okay,” she said eventually. “I’m going to try to phrase this in terms you can understand—”
“That shouldn’t be so very difficult, should it? I don’t consider myself a halfwit—”
“Yes, I know,” she interrupted, rolling her eyes. “But it’s just a really out there kind of story—I’m not sure if I even get it—and you’re such a Victorian—”
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing. Never mind. Just be quiet for a second so I can think about how to word this.”
They sat in silence for several minutes, and just as William was ready to lose patience and demand an answer from her, Buffy said, “It’s because I already knew you.”
He frowned. “I don’t think I—”
“Well, I didn’t know you, exactly. But I knew a different—version—of you, a version who’s no longer—and a friend of mine found this door—and, well, here I am.”
“That makes no sense whatsoever,” he said.
“I told you it wouldn’t!”
“What do you mean by a door? What door did you find?”
“It isn’t really a door. It’s sort of…well, it’s a portal. She didn’t make it or anything, my friend. It’s always been there. She just found it and opened it up for me.”
“A portal to where though? Where are you from?”
“The portal is in England, near the house of another friend of mine. I’ve been staying with him for a few months now, but like I said before, I’m actually from California.” She hesitated and then added reluctantly, “What I didn’t tell you before was that I’m also from 2004.”
“Two thousand and four what?” asked William, by now thoroughly bewildered.
Buffy looked equally confused, but only for a moment. Then she clarified, “The year 2004.”
William looked down at the ground, taking in the scrubby, overgrown grass, the dull, moonlit shine of his own carefully polished calfskin shoes. Somehow, it was preferable to looking at her just then. He asked, and not without a certain amount of difficulty, “So, what you’re telling me is that you are actually from the future? Some type of traveler through time?”
“Sort of. I mean, there’s more to it than just that, but I think we can save that particular revelation for another time.” She smiled faintly. “You look like you’ve had just about all you can take at the moment.”
“Rather.” There was a false note in his laughter, which she noticed immediately. She reached out, laid a hand on his arm.
“William, it’s a lot to take in. I know that. And if you don’t want to take it in—if you don’t want to have anything more to do with me—that’s okay, too. If you want me to, I’ll leave and I won’t come back. I won’t bother you—”
“But you’re not a bother,” he said. The words came automatically from common politeness. They came from something else as well, though he would not name it.
Again, that smile—that pretty, faint smile. She gave his forearm a little squeeze and asked him with deceptive lightness, “You’re sure about that?”
“I’m altogether certain.” Yet even as he said it—and meant it—William was stretching out his free hand, reaching into the space from whence she had come, groping, searching for something that no longer seemed to be present. When he turned back to her, it was with a question in his eyes.
Buffy looked almost apologetic. “It only opens for me,” she said.
“Oh.” He dropped his hand, feeling strangely defeated.
“But you never know,” she added a moment later. “It might open for you, too. Someday.”
He forgot to return her necklace.
It did not even occur to him until much later, as he walked home alone in the moonlight. Of course, she had not asked him for it; she had not mentioned it in any respect during that evening’s discourse. Perhaps she did not care if she got it back. Yet he could not help but feel guilty, for cherished or not, cheap or not, the necklace did not belong to him. He had an obligation to return it to her. He almost turned back in order to do so, but that would have been foolish. Aside from the distance he had already covered, he also knew she would not be there. She had left already. He had seen her go, disappear back through that mysterious gateway into the unknown.
He continued homeward.
It was now so late it was beginning to be early: the stars growing faint, the night sky fading from black to bluish-gray. William felt so tired his knees trembled, but he knew he could not sleep just yet. When he reached his house, he yanked the bell-pull in the foyer to summon a servant. It didn’t matter to him which one. Just a servant.
Seven minutes later, the young hall boy appeared, rubbing his eyes with one fist and clutching the sputtering stub of a candle in the other.
“Yessir?” His voice was slurred, sleepy, but still properly deferential. He bowed clumsily as he spoke.
William did not bother with preliminaries. He reached into his trouser pocket and withdrew Buffy’s choker. “Do you see this?” he asked the hall boy.
The boy did not seem to know quite what to make of this question, but he answered it nonetheless. “Yes, sir. I do, sir.”
“I found it in the garden. I want you to have a look at it.”
The boy gaped at him, clearly bewildered as to why this was necessary at four o’clock in the morning. Yet he took the pendant when William held it out to him, and he dutifully examined it before handing it back.
“I’ve never seen it before, sir, though I could ask around if you like. Some of the others might well have—”
“That won’t be necessary. I want you to say nothing to them about it, do you understand?”
Though he clearly did not understand, the boy nodded. What else could he do?
“Good,” William said briefly. “You may go now. Leave the candle.”
With another quick bow, the boy stumbled off, groping his way back down the dark hallway. William waited until he had gone before allowing himself to smile.
Well! As bizarre as Buffy’s tales of time travel were, they were beginning to appear downright plausible. After all, it was not only him now. The servant boy had seen the necklace—he had held it, acknowledged it—and that must mean it was real. It must mean that.
The whole world couldn’t be mad.
Could it?